LIFE OF COWPER. problem for himself., That he may be ena- That the public school was a scene by no means adapted to the sensitive mind of Cowper is evident. Nor can we avoid cherishing the apprehension that his spirit, naturally morbid, experienced a fatal inroad from that period. He nevertheless acquired the reputation of scholarship, with the advantage of being known and esteemed by some of the aspiring characters of his own age, who subsequently became distinguished in the great arena of public life. without shuddering at the recollection of its wretchedness. Yet to this perhaps the world is indebted for the pathetic and moral eloquence of those forcible admonitions to parents, which give interest and beauty to his admirable poem on public schools. Poets may be said to realize, in some measure, the poetical idea of the nightingale's singing with a thorn at her breast, as their most exquisite songs have often originated in the acuteness of their personal sufferings. Of this obvious truth, the poem just mentioned is a very memorable example; and, if any readers have thought the poet too severe in his strictures on that system of education, to which With these acquisitions, he left Westminwe owe some of the most accomplished characters that ever gave celebrity to a civilized ster at the age of eighteen, in 1749; and, as nation, such readers will be candidly recon- if destiny had determined that all his early ciled to that moral severity of reproof, in re- situations in life should be peculiarly irksome collecting that it flowed from severe personal to his delicate feelings, and tend rather to experience, united to the purest spirit of phi-promote than to counteract his constitutional lanthropy and patriotism. The relative merits of public and private education is a question that has long agitated the world. Each has its partizans, its advantages, and defects; and, like all general principles, its application must greatly depend on the circumstances of rank, future destination, and the peculiarities of character and temper. For the full development of the powers and faculties of the mind-for the acquisition of the various qualifications that fit men to sustain with brilliancy and distinction the duties of active life, whether in the cabinet, the senate, or the forum-for scenes of busy enterprize, where knowledge of the world and the growth of manly spirit seem indispensable; in all such cases, we are disposed to believe, that the palm must be assigned to public edu cation. But, on the other hand, if we reflect that brilliancy is oftentimes a flame which consumes its object, that knowledge of the world is, for the most part, but a knowledge of the evil that is in the world; and that early habits of extravagance and vice, which are ruinous in their results, are not unfrequently contracted at public schools; if to these facts we add that man is a candidate for immortality, and that "life" (as Sir William Temple observes) is but the parenthesis of eternity," it then becomes a question of solemn import, whether integrity and principle do not find a soil more congenial for their growth in the shade and retirement of private education? The one is an advancement for time, the other for eternity. The former affords facilities for making men great, but often at the expense of happiness and conscience. The latter diminishes the temptations to vice, and, while it affords a field for useful and honorable exertion, augments the means of being wise and holy. We leave the reader to decide the great tendency to melancholy, he was removed from a public school to the office of an attorney. He resided three years in the house of a Mr. Chapman, to whom he was engaged by articles for that time. Here he was placed for the study of a profession which nature seemed resolved that he never should practise. The law is a kind of soldiership, and, like the profession of arms, it may be said to require for the constitution of its heroes, "A frame of adamant, a soul of fire." The soul of Cowper had indeed its fire, but fire so refined and ethereal, that it could not be expected to shine in the gross atmosphere of worldly contention. Perhaps there never existed a mortal, who, possessing, with a good person, intellectual powers naturally strong and highly cultivated, was so utterly unfit to encounter the bustle and perplexities of public life. But the extreme modesty and shyness of his nature, which disqualified him for scenes of business and ambition, endeared him inexpressibly to those who had opportunities to enjoy his society, and discernment to appreciate the ripening excellencies of his character. Reserved as he was, to an extraordinary and painful degree, his heart and mind were yet admirably fashioned by nature for all the refined intercourse and confidential enjoyment both of friendship and love; but, though apparently formed to possess and to communicate an extraordinary portion of moral felicity, the incidents of his life were such, that, conspiring with the peculiarities of his nature, they rendered him, at different times, the vicThe variety and depth of his tim of sorrow. sufferings in early life, from extreme tenderness of feeling, are very forcibly displayed in the following verses, which formed part of a letter to one of his female relatives, at the time they were composed. The letter has perished, and the verses owe their preservation to the affectionate memory of the lady to whom they were addressed. Doom'd as I am, in solitude to waste My friend torn from me, and my mistress lost; Whose eye ne'er yet refus'd the wretch a tear; Having concluded the term of his engagement with the solicitor, he settled himself in chambers in the Inner Temple, as a regular student of law; but although he resided there till the age of thirty-three, he rambled (according to his own colloquial account of his early years) from the thorny road of his austere patroness, Jurisprudence, into the primrose paths of literature and poetry. During this period, he contributed two of the Satires in Duncombe's Horace, which are worthy of his pen, and indications of his rising genius. He also cultivated the friendship of some literary characters, who had been his schoolfellows at Westminster, particularly Colman, Bonnell Thornton, and Lloyd. Of these early associates of Cowper, it may be interesting to learn a brief history. Few men could have entered upon life with brighter prospects than Colman. His father was Envoy at the Court of Florence, and his mother was sister to the Countess of Bath. Possessed of talents that qualified him for exertion, with a classical taste perceptible in his translation of Horace's Art of Poetry, and of the works of Terence, he relinquished the bar, to which he had been called, and became principally known for his devotedness to theatrical pursuits. His private life was not consistent with the rules of morality; and he closed his days, after a protracted malady, by dying in a Lunatic Asylum in Paddington, in the 1794. year tion of Plautus. But his talents, instead of being profitably employed, were chiefly marked by a predilection for humor, in the exercise of which he was not very discreet; for the venerated muse of Gray did not escape his ridicule, and the celebrated Ode to St. Cecilia was made the occasion of a public burlesque performance, the relation of which would not accord with the design of this undertaking. He who aims at nothing better than to amuse and divert, and to excite a laugh at the expense of both taste and judgment, proposes to himself no very exalted object. Thornton died in the year 1770, aged forty-seven. Lloyd was formerly usher at Westminster School, but feeling the irksomeness of the situation, resigned it, and commenced author. His Poems have been repeatedly republished. His life presented a scene of thoughtless extravagance and dissipation. Overwhelmed with debt, and pursued by his creditors, he was at length confined in the Fleet Prison, where he expired, the victim of his excesses, at the early age of thirty-one years. We record these facts,-1st, That we may adore that mercy which, by a timely interposition, rescued the future author of the Task from such impending ruin:-2ndly, To show that scenes of gaiety and dissipation, however enlivened by flashes of wit, and distinguished by literary superiority, are perilous to character, health, and fortune; and that the talents, which, if beneficially employed, might have led to happiness and honor, when perverted to unworthy ends, often lead prematurely to the grave, or render the past painful in the retrospect, and the future the subject of fearful anticipation and alarm. Happily, Cowper escaped from this vortex of misery and ruin. His juvenile poems discover a contemplative spirit, and a mind early impressed with sentiments of piety. In proof of this assertion, we select a few stanzas from an ode written, when he was very young, on reading Sir Charles Grandison. To rescue from the tyrant's sword These, these, distinguish from the crowd, The guardians of mankind." Whose bosoms with these virtues heave, Oh! with what matchless speed, they leave The multitude behind!' Then ask ye from what cause on earth To call the blessing down. Such is that heart:-but while the Muse Thy theme, O RICHARDSON, pursues, Her feebler spirits fain:: She cannot reach, and would not wrong, That subject for an angel's song, The hero, and the saint. His early turn to moralize on the slightest occasion will appear from the following verses, which he wrote at the age of eighteen: and in which those who love to trace the rise and progress of genius will, I think, be pleased to remark the very promising seeds of those peculiar powers, which unfolded themselves in the richest maturity at a remoter period, and rendered that beautiful and sublime poem, THE TASK, the most instructive and interesting of modern compositions. Young as the poet was when he produced the following lines, we may observe that he had probably been four years in the habit of writing English verse, as he has said in one of his letters, that he began his poetical career at the age of fourteen, by translating an elegy of Tibullus. I have reason to believe that he wrote many poems in his early life; and the singular merit of this juvenile composition is sufficient to make the friends of genius regret that an excess of diffidence prevented him from preserving the poetry of his youth. fore ah! Why not on me that favor (worthier sure) Conferr dst thou, goddess? Thou art blind, thou say'st; Enough-thy blindness shall excuse the deed. He who could erst with even, equal pace, Pursue his destin'd way with symmetry And some proportion form'd, now, on one side, Curtail'd and maim'd, the sport of vagrant boys, Cursing his frail supporter, treacherous prop! With toilsome steps, and difficult, moves on. Thus fares it oft with other than the feet Of humble villager. The statesman thus, Up the steep road where proud ambition leads, Aspiring, first uninterrupted winds His prosperous way; nor fears miscarriage foul, While policy prevails, and friends prove true: But that support soon failing, by him left Betray'd, deserted: from his airy height On whom he most depended, basely left, Headlong he falls, and, through the rest of life, Drags the dull load of disappointment on. Of a youth, who, in a scene like Bath, could produce such a meditation, it might fairly be expected that he would "In riper life, exempt from public haunt, Find tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, Sermons in stones, and good in every thing." to despond, seemed early to preclude Cowper Though extreme diffidence, and a tendency from the expectation of climbing to the splendid summit of the profession he had chosen ; yet, by the interest of his family, he had pros pects of emolument in a line of life that appeared better suited to the modesty of his nature and to his moderate ambition. In his thirty-first year he was nominated to the offices of Reading Clerk and Clerk of the private Committees in the House of Lords— a situation the more desirable, as such an establishment might enable him to marry early in life; a measure to which he was doubly disposed by judgment and inclination. But the peculiarities of his wonderful mind rendered him unable to support the ordinary duties of his new office; for the idea of reading in public proved a source of torture to his tender and apprehensive spirit. An expedient was devised to promote his interest without wounding his feelings. Resigning his situa tion of Reading Clerk, he was appointed Clerk of the Journals in the same House of Parliament. Of his occupation, in consequence of this new appointment, he speaks in the following letter to a lady, who will become known and endeared to the reader in proportion to the interest he takes in the writings of Cowper. TO LADY HESKETH. The Temple, August 9, 1763. My dear Cousin, - Having promised to write to you, I make haste to be as good as my word. I have a pleasure in writing to you at any time, but especially at the present, when my days are spent in reading the Journals, and my nights in dreaming of them; an employment not very agreeable to a head that has long been habituated to the luxury of choosing its subject, and has been as little His terrors on this occasion arose to such employed upon business as if it had grown an astonishing height, that they utterly overupon the shoulders of a much wealthier gen-whelmed his reason; for, although he had tleman. But the numscull pays for it now, endeavored to prepare himself for his public and will not presently forget the discipline it duty, by attending closely at the office for has undergone lately. If I succeed in this several months, to examine the parliamentary doubtful piece of promotion, I shall have at journals, his application was rendered useless least this satisfaction to reflect upon, that the by that excess of diffidence, which made him volumes I write will be treasured up with the conceive that, whatever knowledge he might utmost care for ages, and will last as long as previously acquire, it would all forsake him the English constitution-a duration which at the bar of the House. This distressing ought to satisfy the vanity of any author who apprehension increased to such a degree, as has a spark of love for his country. Oh, my the time for his appearance approached, that, good Cousin! if I was to open my heart to when the day so anxiously dreaded arrived, you, I could show you strange sights; no- he was unable to make the experiment. The thing I flatter myself that would shock you, very friends who called on him for the purbut a great deal that would make you won- pose of attending him to the House of Lords, der. I am of a very singular temper, and acquiesced in the cruel necessity of his revery unlike all the men that I have ever con- linquishing the prospect of a station so seversed with. Certainly I am not an absolute verely formidable to a frame of such singular fool: but I have more weaknesses than the sensibility. greatest of all the fools I can recollect at present. In short, if I was as fit for the next world as I am unfit for this, and God forbid I should speak it in vanity, I would not change conditions with any saint in Christendom. The conflict between the wishes of honorable ambition and the terrors of diffidence so entirely overwhelmed his health and faculties, that, after two learned and benevolent divines (Mr. John Cowper, his brother, and the cele My destination is settled at last, and I have brated Mr. Martin Madan, his first cousin) obtained a furlough. Margate is the word, had vainly endeavored to establish a lasting and what do you think will ensue, Cousin? I tranquillity in his mind by friendly and relig know what you expect, but ever since I was ious conversation, it was found necessary to born I have been good at disappointing the remove him to St. Alban's, where he resided most natural expectations. Many years ago, a considerable time, under the care of that Cousin, there was a possibility that I might eminent physician, Dr. Cotton, a scholar and prove a very different thing from what I am a poet, who added to many accomplishments at present. My character is now fixed, and a peculiar sweetness of manners, in very adriveted fast upon me, and, between friends, is vanced life, when I had the pleasure of a not a very splendid one, or likely to be guilty personal acquaintance with him. of much fascination. Adieu, my dear Cousin! so much as I love you, I wonder how it has happened I was never in love with you. Thank Heaven that I never was, for at this time I have had a pleasure in writing to you, which in that case I should have forfeited. Let me hear from you, or I shall reap but half the reward that is due to my noble indifference. Yours ever, and evermore, W. C. It was hoped from the change of his station that his personal appearance in parliament might not be required, but a parliamentary dispute made it necessary for him to appear at the bar of the House of Lords, to entitle himself publicly to the office. Speaking of this important incident in a sketch, which he once formed himself, of passages in his early life, he expressed what he endured at the time in these remarkable words: "They whose spirits are formed like mine, to whom a public exhibition of themselves is mortal poison, may have some idea of the horrors of my situation-others can have none." The misfortune of mental derangement is a topic of such awful delicacy, that I consider it to be the duty of a biographer rather to sink, in tender silence, than to proclaim, with circumstantial and offensive temerity, the minute particulars of a calamity to which all human beings are exposed, and perhaps in proportion as they have received from nature those delightful but dangerous gifts, a heart of exquisite tenderness and a mind of creative energy. This is a sight for pity to pursue, But with a soul that ever felt the sting "Tis not, as heads that never ache suppose, Ten thousand, thousand strings at once go loose; Lost, till He tune them, all their power and use. No wounds like those a wounded spirit feels; And thou sad sufferer, under nameless ill, It is in this solemn and instructive light, that Cowper himself teaches us to consider the calamity of which I am now speaking; and of which, like his illustrious brother of Parnassus, the younger Tasso, he was occasionally a most affecting example. Providence appears to have given a striking lesson to mankind, to guard both virtue and genius against pride of heart and pride of intellect, by thus suspending the affections and the talents of two most tender and sublime poets, who resembled each other, not more in the attribute of poetic genius than in the similarity of the dispensation that quenched its light and ardor. From December, 1763, to the following July, the sensitive mind of Cowper appears to have labored under the severest suffering of morbid depression; but the medical skill of Dr. Cotton, and the cheerful, benignant manners of that accomplished physician, gradually succeeded, with the blessing of Heaven, in removing the indescribable load of religious despondency, which had clouded the faculties of this interesting man. His ideas of religion were changed from the gloom of terror and despair to the brightness of inward joy and peace. This juster and happier view of evangelical truth is said to have arisen in his mind, while he was reading the third chapter of Saint Paul's Epistle to the Romans. The words that rivetted his attention were the following: "Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God." Rom. iii. 25. It was to this passage, which contains so Ined an exposition of the Gospel method of salvation, that, under the divine blessing, the poet owed the recovery of a previously disordered intellect and the removal of a load from a deeply oppressed conscience-he saw, by a new and powerful perception, how sin could "be pardoned, and the sinner be saved that the way appointed of God was through the great propitiation and sacrifice upon the cross that faith lays hold of the promise, and thus becomes the instrument of conveying pardon and peace to the soul. It is remarkable how God, in every age, from the first promulgation of the Gospel to the present time, and under all the various odifications of society, barbarian, Scythian, bond or free, has put his seal to this fundamental doctrine of the Gospel. Whether we contemplate man amid the polished scenes of civilized and enlightened Europe, or the rude ferocity of savage tribes -whether it be the refined Hindoo, or the unlettered Hottentot, whose mind becomes accessible to the power and influences of religion, the cause and the effect are the same. It is the doctrine of the cross that works the mighty change. The worldly wise may reject this doctrine, the spiritually wise comprehend and receive it. But, whether it be rejected, with all its tremendous responsibilities, or received with its inestimable blessings, the truth itself still remains unchanged and unchangeable, attested by the records of every church and the experience of every believing heart-"the cross is to them that perish foolishness, but unto us which are saved it is the power of God.” 1 Cor. i. 18. It is impossible not to admire the power, and adore the mercy, that thus wrought a double deliverance in the mind of Cowper by a process so remarkable. Devout contemplation became more and more dear to his reviving spirit. Resolving to relinquish all thoughts of a laborious profession, and all intercourse with the busy world, he acquiesced in a plan of settling at Huntingdon, by the advice of his brother, who, as a minister of the Gospel, and a fellow of Bene't College, Cambridge, resided in that University; a situation so near to the place chosen for Cowper's retirement, that it afforded to these affectionate brothers opportunities of easy and frequent intercourse. I regret that all the letters which passed between them have perished, and the more so, as they sometimes corresponded in verse. John Cowper was also a poet. He had engaged to execute a translation of Voltaire's Henriade, and in the course of the work requested, and obtained, the assistance of William, who translated, as he informed me himself, two entire cantos of the poem. This fraternal production is said to have appeared in a magazine of the year 1759. I have discovered a rival, and probably an inferior translation, so published, but the joint work of the poetical brothers has hitherto eluded all my researches. In June, 1765, the reviving invalid removed to a private lodging in the town of Huntingdon, but Providence soon introduced him into a family, which afforded him one of the most singular and valuable friends that ever watched an afflicted mortal in seasons of overwhelming adversity; that friend, to whom the poet exclaims in the commencement of the Task, Whose arm, this twentieth winter, I perceive And witness, dear companion of my walks, Fast locked in mine, with pleasure. such as love, Confirmed by long experience of thy worth, And well tried virtues, tould alone inspire; |